From the outside looking in, GameZombie.tv may appear to be “just another online video game review website,” said Lecturer Spencer Striker, GameZombie creator.
Look a little closer, and you’ll see just how expansive and all encompassing the site truly is.
With everything from game developer interviews to complete coverage of every major game conference held in the United States, GameZombie thrives on breaking new ground and being ahead of the curve.
GameZombie was an idea born from Striker’s boredom with online video game reviews while he attended Indiana University in the fall of 2006.
“I watched a lot of video game reviews online, and I remember thinking the way they used video sucked,” Striker said. “It was so lame. It was just one shot that didn’t move, and the reviewers were bad on camera. I took one look at it and was like … we could do better than that.”
Striker knew that for his site to stand out from the crowd, it would have to have a lot going for it.
“I wanted to do a video game review based website, but I knew it had to have a lot of stuff,” Striker said. “It needed some really impressive video work, including music and sound design. There also needed to be multiple cameras and cool editing. It had to be something innovative and entertaining to watch.”
The YouTube site for GameZombie launched in February 2007 with a review of “Mortal Kombat: Armageddon.”
By the following semester, more and more students got involved and GameZombie became the largest internship program at Indiana University.
As the program grew larger, Striker decided to move on to UW-Whitewater.
“I thought it would probably fall apart at Indiana the moment that I left. In some ways, GameZombie Indiana carried GameZombie Wisconsin for probably the first four months I was here,” Striker said. “Then, in January 2010, we started working together and have been doing so ever since.”
When GameZombie arrived on campus, Striker said he could tell that the students getting involved were “super enthusiastic” and “really happy” to have something like this at UW-Whitewater.
Tye Gustina is one of those “enthusiastic” students.
He’s a senior who has been with GameZombie for three semesters and is now the producer.
Gustina, along with 34 other students on campus involved with the program, works hard every day trying to spread the GameZombie name.
“We try to get our name out there all over the web, basically, all over the world. We’re always asking ourselves what’s going to make GameZombie better?” Gustina said.
Currently, GameZombie has three main areas that students can work in. Web video production, website design and development, and business development.
Meetings are held at 6:30 p.m. every Monday in McGraw 127.
What does the future hold for GameZombie? Well, after a summer in which they produced 42 original videos and accumulated 1.2 million views, the sky’s the limit. Striker is looking forward to this semester including a new show the program plans on launching, as well as, a possible new spinoff.
